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3/5/16

News hitting the wires today is that according to the ex-governor of Bolivar State in Venezuela, 28 miners were attacked murdered "and quartered" by a rival band of miners connected to a rival gang of illegal gold miners known as "el topo" (the mole).

The incident occurred when the victims were celebrating the discovery of a new gold vein they were about to start mining at a traditional celebration party called a "bulla" (literally "noise" in Spanish). The rival gang were alerted to the discovery and moved in, killing the miners at their party and dumping their bodies in an old mine shaft. Families of the apparent victims have blocked roads in the region in protest.

Yes indeedy, it's the moment you've all been waiting for and here's this year's edition:

Instructions:

1) Print off your copy and carry it around with you at PDAC next week.
2) Hear a phrase, then tick it off.
3)
First person with a Full House to contact IKN wins a prize. I dunno...
money, a packet of M&Ms, a car, a kiss...I'll think of
something.

Aaron Ramsey just scored today. It's Spurs 0 Gunners 1 at half time. For more on The curse of Aaron Ramsey , here's a link (millions more out there) and before you scoff, I think the same about technical analysis.

Third Place: "Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha....No".The whole dog and pony circus show is of zero interest and if fame were the spur you'd have found me on the "mining circuit" years ago. The whole strutting and preening gig is of zero interest and fame is not the spur behind IKN. Neither is money the spur so if I work out one day why I spend so much of my time writing this humble corner of cyberspace I'll tell you.

Second Place: "What Clive did". The details on one part of the week's most viewed post below. As a certain fund manager noted in their mail to me yesterday (and yeah, I've had a ton of feedback on this affair), "Thank you for bringing the truth to light. It is a sad state of affairs with regard to corporate governance in Canada that this man is still running a company with these numerous shenanigans". If it were the first time The Clive has put on one of his "evening shows" you could let it pass but it's not, it's one of umpteen and it's high time the board of B2Gold did something proactive about their company' obvious weakness. If it were me I'd start with an official warning.

First Place: "The BMO Conference Fight Night: Clive Johnson vs Andrew Kaip, plus undercard of Keith Neumeyer vs John Burzynski". Here's another reason why the conference scene has no appeal, as it's been obvious over the years that you, audience and potential audience of IKN, are far more interested in the salacious gossip posts that the ones with something useful to say about the mining industry. Yeah I'm talking to you, all you people who turn your noses up at the Celeb Gossip cable TV shows and what the Kardashians are doing this week, your snobbery isn't just a pain in the ass, it's hypocritical too. Given you the chance to read on some peer's faux pas, you're over at IKN in the thousands. In other words yeah, this was the most visited single post on IKN this week and by a country mile. It'll probably be next week's most visited post, too.

3/4/16

Not the first time this has been The Friday OT, but it gets its repeat because over time it's become a bit of a theme tune to IKN. That's due to the Bill Hicks line they use as the chorus* as it oftens reminds your humble scribe of the readership here who come over, chortle and guffaw when Company X or company Y gets snarked at, but then get huffy and indignant if this humble corner of cyberspace has the temerity to attack a company in which they own shares. Oh the humanity.

The geographical footprint is logical, the classic O'Dea exit strategy is to sell rather than to produce, the ticket price is a reasonable upside. In other words 1) this deal makes sense and 2) I sure did sell my TGM.v shares a month too early. Oh well.

Want to know how much of an asshole Clive Johnson was at the BMO conference this week? Well here it comes, because after 1) receiving unsolicited e-mails and 2) checking with eyewitnesses, IKN is good about giving you this version of events. We're also going to keep the names of the innocent out of this, because the only person who deserves light shone upon them is the one that's running a U$1Bn market cap company. Up to you to decide whether that sort of responsibility is worthy of this sort of behaviour.

The whole shebang started earlier in the day when a woman present at the BMO conference (that's all you're getting on her) had the opportunity to ask Clive Johnson about the state of play at B2Gold (BTO.to) (BTG). Her questions weren't the normal soft-soap cookie cutter things that sellside anal ysts come out with, but were well-researched and not easy to answer. Apparently, The Clive got more than a little annoyed at this line of questioning and didn't like the experience at all.

Cut to the evening and with the talking and presentations done, it was time for the BMO cocktail reception and by the time the woman in question got to the gig in a group with her associates, Clive Johnson had been there for quite some time and was obviously drunk. As in obviously. On recognizing his interrogator of earlier that day he started to berate her, first among his small group but after a little while and as these things happen at informal gatherings, the two groups came into close proximity and then the fun really began. The Clive decided that his massive ego had been damaged and started verbally abusing his victim in front of everyone, loudly aggressively and drunkenly. The victim of this abuse was obviously upset by all this, but that didn't stop The Clive, who went on and on until, and it must be said very gallantly under the circumstances, Andrew Kaip stepped in and tried to calm things down by talking to The Clive. The reaction was all-too predictable as the drunk and boorish Johnson turned his bullying manner onto Kaip with use of such wonderful phrases as....

"No one talks to me in that f__king way, I founded this f__king company, I'm a f__king CEO"

...and
that is a direct quote from one of the unsolicited mails
IKN received that was backed up by another, separate eyewitness. Fortunately Kaip is a gentleman and smart, so he didn't stoop to The Clive's level and remained calm and dignified. Those present have all said that Kaip's actions, rather brave under the circumstances and considering The Clive's previous violent history in these sorts of moments, saved things from getting a lot worse.

Bottom line: Ye shall know them by their fruits. Clive Johnson may have founded and built both Bema Gold and then B2Gold, but is Clive Johnson still capable of running B2Gold? We need to consider his present day as much as his track record and, considering the obvious decadence of its CEO, whether B2Gold's recent under-performance is a direct reflection of that. And whether he needs to be replaced before things get even worse.

We're now at that juncture, when a bit of early mover cash has flowed into the miners, but mostly the decent quality producers or the exploration-stage companies with serious management teams and decent rocks to play with.

Now comes the acid test, will Canada learn from its years of misery, or will they be stupid enough to fund things like this?

Honey Badger Exploration Inc. (TSX VENTURE:TUF) ("Honey Badger" or the
"Company") announces that it intends to offer for sale, on a
non-brokered private placement basis, up to 13,125,000 "flow-through"
units of the Company (the "FT Units") at a price of $0.04 per FT Unit
and up to 10,000,000 non-flow-through units of the Company (the "Non-FT
Units") at a price of $0.03 per Non-FT Unit for aggregate gross proceeds
to Honey Badger of up to $825,000 (the "Offering"). Each FT Unit will
be comprised of one common share in the capital of the Company (each, a
"Common Share") issued on a "flow-through" basis within the meaning of
such term in the Income Tax Act (Canada), and one Common Share
purchase warrant (each, a "FT Unit Warrant"), with each FT Unit Warrant
being exercisable to acquire one non-flow-through Common Share at a
price of $0.07 for a period of 36 months following the closing date of
the Offering. Each Non-FT Unit will be comprised of one Common Share
(issued on a non-"flow-through" basis) and one Common Share purchase
warrant (each, a "Non-FT Warrant") with each Non-FT Warrant being
exercisable to acquire one Common Share at a price of $0.05 for a period
of 36 months following the closing date of the Offering. continues here

Up to you folks: Just a couple of months ago you were at the TSX townhall meetings with your pitchforks in your hands, demanding better capital markets and "change". Fact is, you'll be condemned to the same cycle if you put money into these dogs and be clear, TUF.v above is only one, topical because that NR is from today but there are literally hundreds more that need to die.

Buy all the silver exposure you want, market-chasers. It's still not even at yearly highs, let alone late 2015 numbers. The hypnotic effect of seeing t move away from the 14-handle have you all huffing and puffing but let's be clear about this, there are still very few silver mining companies making a profit at these market prices.

The day you stop confusing silver with gold is the day you'll become a smarter investor.

3/3/16

On the main page, right above this post...up there, i.e. you won't see it from your RSS or daily digest mailer services, you need to visit the blog. Here's a screenshot of the poll (don't click on it, it's just a photo of the real thing):

Seven types of crap going down in Miami as the mining world's "great" and...errr..."good" let their hair down.

The main event last night was a fight between Clive Johnson, CEO of B2Gold (BTO.to) (BTG) , who got into a brawl with Andrew Kaip, the analyst at BMO. And the reason was, apparently and unsurprisingly, a girl. On the Kaip side it's a big surprise, because he's known to one and all as a mild-mannered, quiet and unobtrusive kind of guy. However The Clive has previous form on this type of thing, as IKN noted last year (that one was over a girl too, so we can at least assume The Clive is not in touch with his feminine side).

Meanwhile we even had an undercard fight last night, as Keith Neumeyer of First Majestic Silver (AG) (FR.to) and First Mining Finance (FF.v) infamy got down and dirty with John Burzynski of the Dundee asset book play Oban Mining. IKN has fewer details on this particular confrontation (except that it happened) but considering those two I'd bet they were fighting over a piece of land rather than a woman. This was a bantamweight showdown.

As news firms up IKN will dish the dirt in updates, of course.

UPDATE: This does not look good for The Clive, however it would seem that Andrew Kaip conducted himself very honourably, did not come to blows with The Clive and in fact was only intervening to stop The Clive from verbally abusing a woman attending the BMO conference. And Clive dude, you've got a f--king* drink problem so sort it out before you damage "your f--king* company" (your own cute phrase from last night, back in your face you boorish dumbass). And yes, people CAN speak to you like that, especially if you're acting like an asshole in public.

UPDATE 2: We hear the Neumeyer vs Burzynski bust-up was over First Mining Finance's (FF.v) recent purchase of Clifton Star. John laughed at Keith in the face for buying one of the worst piece of crap companies in the whole of Canada until Keith lost it. Hilarity ensued.

Last week the message went out from site owner Gary Tanashian that his original website, Biiwii, was no more. As from now and onward his most excellent work on charts, market macro and no-nonsense BS-cutting commentary is found right here, his main site Notes From The Rabbit Hole.

All those people who follow Gary's work would be advised to update links (as your author has done, over there on the right) and stick NFTRH on their RSS, or get the free mailer service, or however you prefer to access these things. Strong, intelligent and independent analysis is a rare thing out there, the best need your support and Gary's up there with the very cream of the crop. Go see.

I've been sent this five times now, which is sufficient nudging I think.

On this link find the question and answer session that Rick Rule did regarding "optionality" a couple of weeks ago, which was released to the general public yesterday (Sprott clients have had access to it all this time). In it, Rule answers queries from clients and goes over this whole optionality idea (a.k.a the zero sum game of Greater Fool). And as one of my mailers, reader MS points out...

"FYI. I assume that several people have already forwarded this to you,
but just in case - you were mentioned/addressed several times during the
Q&A session. Kind of funny, because at one point, one can sense
some annoyance with the attention your comments have received."

...so you get to hear Rule's drawl of the word "Otto" all as a special bonus. Though for what it's worth, on my reading of his voice I don't think he was annoyed at me or the questions, he sounds like that all the time. :-). Here's the link again, just in case.

3/2/16

On February 26th, a old-looking man, who had all the signs of an easy mark for criminals, was entering his home when he was attacked and robbed by a young gang member, who was then helped by his accomplice.

It turned out to be a fatal mistake, because the old man they picked on happens to be retired General Ramirez Guerrero of the Dominican Republic armed forces. As the two thugs made off, the general got up off the floor, went into his house, quickly came out with a rifle he had in there, chased them up the street, took aim and shot one of the two in the head, instant death. Here's the whole episode captured on film.

The general was arrested and taken into custody, but when the video you see above was released public clamour in Dom Rep saw him let out on March 1st.

Yes indeedy, it's the moment you've all been waiting for and here's this year's edition:

Instructions:

1) Print off your copy and carry it around with you at PDAC next week.
2) Hear a phrase, then tick it off.
3) First person with a Full House to contact IKN wins a prize. I dunno... money, a packet of M&Ms, a car, a kiss...I'll think of something.

UPDATE: Reader AK writes into IKN Nerve Centre to note that the Canadian Dollar chart of FNV is healthier viewing, or in his words, "...TSX FNV chart is a whole lot prettier...". The problem is that FNV is a serious mining company, so you need a serious currency to gauge it correctly. The Loonie doesn't count.

As a prelude, I can't help but notice that the news this morning was front-run to the tune of 32% yesterday, typical Vancouver scam of course (what do you expect from a CEO.ca sponsor like Mark Smith?).

But to the point; it sounds all cool and wonderful that Largo (LGO.v) has "a deal", right? Bothered to read to contents or the NR yet? Yes? Ah good. Understood it? Ah, thought not, so allow IKN and the wonderful birds to help you out on what this deal REALLY means:

Gold's set to make a decision in mid-March, according to the pretty pattern. Well, in fact it's an inanimate object and has no consciousness as we humans know it, so it's probably us that impose a decision on the metal...but you know what I mean.

3/1/16

And here it is, the chart of the stick messy CUM quarterly results, up to date with today's numbers which are out on SEDAR this evening, but bizarrely there's no NR yet...something you're not too proud about in the numbers, Mister Jim O´Rourke?

How people still give this company a positive equity value is a question only Canadians can answer. This time CUM shot to a $45.82m dollar quarterly loss and couldn't even make a gross profit...down by $3.454m is some grossly bad CUM. To add to the stickiness, CUM has a working cap deficit of $15m as at year end, but incredibly if I glance across at the scoreboard you people give it a $60m market cap.

According to the dictionaries of this world, a prophylactic is "a course or measure used to prevent disease". Here's a company badly in need of one of those, cauterize this source of bad seed before it's too late, people.

UPDATE: So I've just noticed that CUM announced on Feb 22nd...so why have the filings appeared on SEDAR today? And how did I miss them a week and a bit ago? Mysteries....

Rather than the normal focus on
trades still open, let’s review the six trades that we’ve closed here at The
IKN Weekly in 2016. Before the real analysis we need to mention Phoscan
Chemicals, which I bought in March 2015 at 28c and sold in January at 26.5c. It
needs mentioning in passing because it’s a closed trade in 2016 but it’s not
really a good example, as this was a left-over trade from 2015 that was looking
for a modest win on M&A activity but when it came (as expected) the
management decision was to go for a poor deal (sigh).

With that out the way, let’s get to
the real business and the other five closed trade in 2016:

This weekend NGD is
priced at U$3.16. If I’d held onto my shares, the pre-commissions profit would
be 53.4%. It was as high as U$3.46 this week, too.

In other words, apart from the sale
of Atacama Pacific at 40c, as things stand today all my sales in 2015 have
either turned out to be too early or way too early. Now context is clearly
necessary and to have booked five winners in two short months isn’t to be
sniffed at, a win is a win and all that jazz. Also, I have to say that on a
personal level I’m not overly annoyed in having left money on the table on
those trades. I’m only slightly annoyed in fact; the bad selling of True Gold
on the political flare-up in Burkina grates a little because I read the
situation badly. Also, I should have given MUX a little more time, but overall
it’s the type of thing I personally used to get pissed (with myself) about much
more in the past than I do now. I’ve also learned that however difficult it is
to ‘buy well’ it’s ten times harder to ‘sell well’ and the compromise of
“selling at a profit”, even if it’s far from the best profit that could have
been achieved, is one I’m willing to accept. That’s me, hi pleased
to meet you. And yes that’s right, I am not you and you are not me but all the
same it’s necessary to point out, kind and wonderful people who send me money
in exchange for this publication, that in the last couple of months I’ve shown
a clear tendency to hit the sell button too early.

I’m not a great trader, never have
been and never will be. When I buy at absolute bottoms or sell at absolute tops
it’s pure luck, nothing more nor less and my developed attitude isn’t of
competition with the next woman or man, it’s a competition against that
nebulous entity we know as ‘the market’ and if I can score a win it matters
very little if the guy next to me starts on the “huh? Only 50% up on a trade?
In this market? Hey, I bought XYZ at 12 and now its 34 and I know it’s going to
go to....” etc. I take my wins, I also take my losses, I owe nothing to anybody
on either type of result. With that said I do feel a responsibility to those
who read The IKN Weekly because you’re kind enough to pay me real money and
perhaps U$40 in one month isn’t so much in absolute terms in the great scheme
of things, but it’s symbolically very important for me. I won’t play coy with
you, I do like it when I hear via feedback that you’ve followed me into trades.
The thing that bugs me is if you hit the sell button at the same time as me
(and my personal objectives) then feel hard done by as the stock then continues
to zoom higher (all the time as I exhort you to hold and add B2Gold which
treads water yet another week). So if your decision process if affected by
mine, let this section also be an influence on when or whether you sell your
trades.

Bottom
line:
I have a weak spot in my armoury at the moment, I’ve been selling too early.
Please take that into account.

...doing other things and sorting things out that need to be sorted. The blog gets short shrift today. And hey Tommy, that mail I sent you yesterday wasn't a joke, you're in line for legal action if it happens again. So cute the way you don't even bother to reply, ignorant lardsack.

I don't own any, but you'd all be better off buying Tinka (TK.v) for Zn speculation, not this stock for headless chickens pushed in by greedy brokerages. TV.to is the microcosm of everything that's wrong with the Canadian capital markets system, but you dumbfucks insist on Feeding The Animals.

2/29/16

Jeez, these Henk van Alphen companies are absolutely shameless. Not free cash flow positive yet, Mr. Cruise? Need yet another bailout of your horrid failed model? After all you've been promising us over the years, too. Anyway, sling another 25 million papers on the ever growing pile of diluted sludge you call a share structure. And pump that zinc thing yeah? The metal of the future (and always will be).

Message body

Dear Mark,

I
was interested in talking to you about speaking at our Mines and Money
Americas show. Our magazine, Mining Journal, just published a list of
the most influential people in the Canadian mining industry mentioning
your name.

Taking place 27 to 28 September in Toronto, we already have the support of 30 leading institutions such as
BMO, TD Securities, Silver Wheaton, TSX and the Ontario Government. Early confirmed speakers include
Rick Rule and Frank Holmes. Please see attached an agenda plus a press release about the event.

History of Mines and Money Americas

Mines and Money (www.minesandmoney.com)
was established in 2003. We are the leader in global mining finance events. Institutional investors comprise 40%
of our audience. In 2015 we had speakers such as Rick Rule, Evy Hambro,
Robert Friedland, Don Lindsay, Frank Holmes and Pierre Lassonde.
As such, we attract junior miners, majors and mid-tiers.

"...Raging River has become aware that Director and CEO Russ Hallbauer and
Vice President Brian Battison bought 652,074 shares and 31,000 shares
respectively in the month of January, 2016 based on material non-public
information of the $70MM Red Kite financing, executed on January 29,
2016 and the filing of a material change report on February 8, 2016."

...what they forgot to mention afterwards is how they were immediately re-opened by the informal/artisanal/ilegal* miners and are back in use.

That's what this report in El Colombiano over the weekendis all about, plus the way in which regional level directives from the Antioquia government are being roundly ignored by local level Buriticá politicos.

So people, let's make this clear once again, for what seems like the 500th time: Your mining company can have all the pretty permit papers it likes, but what's been proven time and time again in South America is that if you don't have the agreement and support of the local people for your mine, it just isn't going to happen. Ever. If you haven't bailed on Continential Gold (CNL.to) yet there's still time, because a loonie 50 is better than zero and that's where this one is going, the same place as Ari Sussman's last community risk disaster at Serra Pelada.

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